Chang-Er Flies to the Moon coming soon!
An enthralling visual theatrical experience, that blends a range of traditional and contemporary performance styles to tell the much-beloved tale of the Chinese moon goddess Chang-Er and her husband, the archer-hero Hou Yi.
Kun/Shadow Whitesnake current season
Kun opera and shadow puppetry blend seamlessly in this traditional legend. Whitesnake is a magical animal spirit who transforms herself into a young woman, and experiences love and struggle in the human world.
Inspired by the movement and staging of traditional Peking Opera, this contemporary dance theater piece combines Western and Chinese performance technique to tell a story of three women in a modern corporate office.
Three thousand years of Chinese literary history is illuminated in this eclectic blend of puppetry and live theatre techniques, featuring original music, song, and poetry recitation.
An artist’s struggle between the boundaries of traditional beliefs, images and the limitless possibilities that open up after crossing the boundaries into a new world are presented through dance and theater.
Stories of struggle and economic survival among Chinese immigrants in contemporary New York City are dramatized by a large cast ranging in age from 9 to 90, using mask, puppetry, Chinese Opera, dance and Broadway-style music numbers.
CTW’s collaboration with Bread & Puppet Theater’s Peter Schumann incorporates the ancient literary ruminations on peace and war with the graphic interplay of light and darkness of Western and Asian shadow theater.
Monkey King in America: Day Jobs, Opera Dreams
Interweaving traditional stories from the epic Journey to the West with the personal biographies of CTW’s troupe of talented Peking Opera actors. They recount their travails as classically trained artists forced into the underground economy, revealing the delicate balance of hardship and hope.
History, shadow theater, and jazz are woven together in these biographical stories of the three artistic “godmothers” of Chinese Theatre Works.
CTW’s award-winning original production combines 16th century Kun opera with the 19th century European style of toy theatre puppetry to tell a story of love that goes beyond life and death.
An autobiographical narrative of cultural change and continuity told through Peking Opera and Western toy theater, Two Horses explores the presence of the performer in both traditional and contemporary theater.
This 12th century Yuan opera fairytale romance is re-imagined to explore issues of ethnic and cultural identity in contemporary America.
